So here is the question: should the government tell people they can't use food stamps for junk food or should they stay out?

http://www.clickorlando.com/...358/-/fpgcmq/-/index.html

Food stamps are a government program, yes? The people are living off of government sufferance. Think feudalism: If I give you land, I expect service. If the government gives you money after you beg for it, it should have the right to tell you what you can buy with it (within reason, of course; the purpose of the program is to keep people from starving, after all, so telling them they can't buy actual food would be going too far. I'm sure someone smarter than me can develop a contract to that effect).

The government is giving people food stamps to help them out. If people eat junk food they are liable to become overweight and malnourished. Both of these health issues lead to future costs which is something the government wants to minimize. If you don't like the free food choices you are provided you can either get a job of be thankful for it. Limiting someone's free food to healthy choices really seems reasonable to me.

Since when is junk food a need?



http://www.msnbc.msn.com/...s_news-life/#.Ty9QLtQjKCl

"Unless you are a new mother or somehow handicap or disabled you get no medical coverage... "

If you live in Wisconsin.

The BadgerCare Plus Core Plan provides access to health care services to long-term uninsured adults. If your income is at or below 200% of the federal guidelines (for current income guidelines, go to badgercareplus.org/fpl.htm); are age 19 through 64 who do not have children or do not have dependent children under age 19 living with you, you may be able to enroll in the BadgerCare Plus Core Plan.

http://www.dhs.wisconsin.gov/...ercareplus/core/index.htm

http://www.snopes.com/...ns/graphics/foodstamp.jpg

And I wish I could eat like that this weekend to...

Fat Americans! eat fruit!

Fruit shaped burgers?

yes fruit shaped like burgers fat boy

Hmmm well im eating junkfood as i read this read!

+1 junkfood

You are eating food's junk? Gay

And I am hardly fat, I am 200 pounds on a 6'1 feet height, is not skinny, but not fat/obese either.

"working my way to reach 180 again"

that's not what your man boobs are telling me.

You are already not allowed to eat prepared/pre-cooked meals like rotisserie chicken. I see junk food as no different than that. Btw, my super market has a significant proponent of people using food stamps, I would say one of the saddest things is seeing people being unable to buy basic necessaries since their benefits are not large enough/they do not have the money to survive and have to not purchase everything they would like to buy for their families.

My budget for groceries is $150 a week for a family of 4. People on food stamps eat better than I do.

The vast majority of food sold in the U.S. is junk food.Look at the obesity rate.

Before the government starts restricting WHAT one can buy, they should restrict who's getting it in the first place. There are far too many people that use the food stamp program/other assistance programs as an excuse NOT to get or even LOOK for a job. Far too many people that HAVE jobs, albeit low paying, that cannot make ends meet (rent, electricity, food,BASIC necessities) as prices continue to go up, but do not qualify for ANY assistance because they HAVE a job.

I agree with auto on defining junk food, we each have different opinions. I find string cheese(low fat) a healthy 60cal mid afternoon snack, he considers it junk food.

Your right I do they were willing to give me $35 a month based on my income not worth my time. You are such a kind person autosubmit calling someone retarded you don't know anything about, it doesn't get any kinder than that.

What should I cut. Hmmm maybe the doctor bills for my son who has a heart condition (aortic stenosis). And before you say anything I have insurance but deductibles must be paid. How bout my house payment so i can lose the house and live off of the government in substandard housing. My electric bill? Gas bill? oh I know my water bill who needs to bath.

Before you start criticizing you might want to know a little about the ones you are doing it to. I live amongst the people who collect food stamps and see the abuse. Selling them for alcohol, drugs and other things. But I am sure you don't think that is done or is impossible that it could be happening but it does. I see it with my own eyes.

How long does it take you to collect foodstamps? 7 hours? If it is an hour of work a month to get food stamps that is like working for $35/hour...

Gas to get there. Time to take off work to be there. At what point is it a wash and not worth it? Plus truly I dont want your money. You have worked hard for it. educated yourself to be able to earn it. I wont rob someone on the street to pay my bills I wont let the government to do it for me.

Depends on the gas mileage of your vehicle, the distance traveled, the price of gasoline, your hourly wage and the amount of time necessary to take off work

As long as $35 > gas_price*distance_traveled/gas_mileage + hourly_wage*time_off then it is worth your while to get the food stamps. Assuming you make $15/hour, need to take off 1.5 hours, drive 12 miles, for a 20 mpg vehicle at $3.50/gallon you are effectively making $10.40. That is equivalent to seeing a $10 bill on the ground and bending over to pick it up. I assume you would do that if presented the opportunity.

Interesting argument.. rather than addressing the issue of wages and help people in TY's situation and raising people up, the argument is to address the issue of social safety net and "abuse" and bring people down.

Perhaps the next suggestion will be to ship all the bums to labor camps to concentrate them in an area to force them to work or to "incentivise" them to work or throw them in jail...

People like TY are great for legitimate business owners too.. I bet I could offer him or someone like him $$500/month to simply let me place unmarked boxes of "lost merchandise" in his garage and no questions would be asked...

As an aside.. you realize there is a connection between the price of oil and the price of your food, right? :)

I live with in my means. I wasnt crying that is all i can spend. It is what i have to spend to eat for the week. I dont buy the junk food I buy what i need and no more. Why should we pay for others to get doritios, icecream, chocolate cake, etc etc . Americans are constantly being accused of being fat lazy people. Why then when its said we shouldnt pay for us to be that way everyone gets their panties in a bunch

How much is the lowered self esteem I feel having to do that worth?

The thing is, if you start giving government assistance to people who have low wages, you are admitting to a problem that in general no one wants to admit to.

That sounds like a personal problem. Just because this country has an unlivable wage issue doesn't mean there is anything wrong with the workers...

I wish minimum wage was low here. 9.04 an hour here is killing me!

this whole take it if you can get it attitude is disgusting. Detmer i didnt peg you for the type, unless of course you are just trolling him for the "not worth my time" statement in which case you know he meant not worth his pride.

im with TY on this one.

and foodstamps can easily be abused, and are abused regularly. i think one major thing is not allowing them to be used at convenience stores.

Saw someone buying a bag of Doritos and a hot dog from 711 with their food stamps, drove off in a new car with some nice and shiny rims. Pretty much ruined my day.

I have no idea what TY does or what factors into his analyses but I was demonstrating a cost-benefit analysis of the situation. I have no idea the extent of the nourishment of his family but I am saying that financially it may make sense if he is having trouble making ends meet. A pride issue is completely separate.

And I have a friend who was in chiropractic school and signed up for foodstamps because he could. Apparently that was common practice at his school. I found that appalling and definitely don't think that just because you can take something that you should.

there are alot of shady stores that allow people to buy beer/cigarettes with food stamps and just ring them up as something else. thats why they should be required to be used at GROCERY stores to buy real food.

food stamps are to be used for necessities, the only necessities conveniences stores offer are milk, bread, and eggs.

Nope - food stamps should only be able to buy staple foods.

If you wanna be able to buy twinkies, cigarettes, and other luxury items... get a job in order to do so.

Pizza is a vegetable.

Tis a silly idea... people using food stamps don't buy junk food. They buy steak.

And I so wish I were being facetious.

Agree 100% I have a job and can not afford luxury items :( Limit food stamps to staple foods to be purchased in a grocery store period. I don't have the food budget to afford more than one "junk" item per week and I do not collect food stamps. My weekly food budget is $50 for my son and myself and I make it work quite well. We don't eat steak or seafood often but we are not hungry by any means. I know people who get $200/month for just themselves, primarily live off of the junk food they can buy with their food stamps and end up starving themselves for a week because they are out. I know others who do buy cigarettes or other items at shady convenience stores who will just ring it up as something else. I have once been offered by some crackhead looking woman to buy my groceries with her food stamps in trade for cash.

We should not have to afford other people junk food or anything other non-essential item when many of us who work can not afford those luxuries for ourselves.

The government should be able to attach any strings they want to a handout, IMO.

Careful Nuketon living within your means will get you called an idiot. oh wait its retarded to live within your means. I had to reread it

I like the idea of restricting spending to only grocery stores! Save money, eat smarter and live better.

I wish there was a like button :)

I was under the impression that you can't buy junk food with food stamps?

It is sad that SOME people ruin it for others by cheating or ripping off the system.

http://www.journaltimes.com/...df-81b3-001cc4c03286.html

the govt should have the right to limit what people do with it... it is a govt handout for food..

Other welfare payments are not regulated, maybe that needs to be changed too..

We had(Australia) a baby bonus of 5k to every woman having a child, no questions asked just a one of payment, just crazy.

Oh I could go on and on about this one. Originally the Dept. of Agriculture established a program where the US would buy surplus agricultural products and process them to distribute to the needy (remember the government cheese? thats where that came from).

After a while, the big agri-business and food producers realized that there was a buck to be made, so they went to the D of Ag and said "look, you guys are not efficient. moving food is our business so let us take over the distribution of food to the needy and we'll provide better service". The plan was to provide the needy with faux money that could only be used to buy food. Then they could buy right off the shelf, and Food Inc. would get reimbursed by uncle Sam at a slightly discounted rate.

This is how the dept of Agriculture ended up running the food stamp business. The problem is that it was no longer about surplus agricultural production - it was all about producing food that was profitable for Food Inc. even at the discounted food stamp reimbursement rate. Along came the 1980's and early 90's and guess what starts showing up on the shelves of discount grocers more and more. Highly processed packaged foods made primarily of grain products, veg oil and salt - aka junk food. It turns out that when food manufactured treat food like chemistry they can crank out the poptarts pretty darn profitably.

Make no mistake, the way the $87B food stamp program is managed - it has become just as much of a transfer of wealth to corporate interests as any Halliburton defense contract in Iraq. An interesting side effect, and the basis of the recent push to prevent FS for being used to buy junk food, obesity rates get much higher as poverty increases. If you will follow the money, the biggest opponents of restricting FS usage is coming from Big Food and Agri-business. There are nearly 40M Americans receiving FS, thats a chunk of change worth fighting over.

I thought the government gave companies the green light to make junk food, gm food, and cheap nutritionless food the breakfasts of champions. Champions meaning people who can't afford food that's good.

What is the benefit of keeping the poor healthy with good food?

- They live longer - costlier burden on hospitals.
- They might stop feeling so sh*tty and become more able and look for better jobs. Then who's going to do the sh*t jobs.

Better to let them feed themselves junk food. It's way cheaper unless you're a very good shopper. The fatter more incapable they get the faster they die. It's unspoken, but it's survival of the richest.

The US FDA is just a huge conflict of interest. It's about $ not food safety. They just need to push the boundaries of safety enough so that it doesn't make the news and scare people.

Lmao. Conspiracy theorist make me laugh. If it was about getting them to die sooner why are cigarettes taxed at such a high rate. They should be handing them out for free if that was the case. I dont know the figures and dont feel like looking them up. but i am willing to bet that the poor and uneducated are smoking at a greater rate than the richer educated people.

I think its ok for them to limit it and cut off the junk food, when I worked at wal-mart in college I'd see people use the ebt cards all the time and half their basket was junk foods.

Sounds like the GOP 20 year healthcare policy projection.

Feed the poor only GMO foods, that'll solve the problem very quickly!

Just enforce the rules and punish heavily those that break them. And lets share Government info with-in the Government.
If a Mother of 3 works and earns 17K , just one there income tax receive over 8500 in "free money"( child credit, and EIC), then when they receive Energy credits, Free school Lunch, Books, and Government housing that alone would exceed there other income making not only their children as being support less then half by the parent, but even the parent isn't providing their own support. SO then the next year they should be getting ZERO exemptions and not be the provider for head of household.

I work at a grocery store and you wouldn't believe the things people buy on food stamps. Steak, lobster, crab, or chips, ramen noodles and gallon jugs of unidentifiable various colored drink. Seriously its either end of the spectrum. They either buy food that I can't afford to buy on a regular basis or they buy food with little to no nutritional value. And I love when the people on food stamps buy lobsters and then walk out to their bmw or lexus. There needs to be some form of regulation. Nothing so rigid as to keep people from being able to make personal choices about their diet but something that keeps people from using their food stamps for foods previously listed.

Is it just me, or does anyone else find it ironic that the closest thing to a pro-junkfood post in this thread came from a guy named oats?

No they should not be able to buy junk food with food stamps.